It's been a while

With the extension work and builders blocking the green house and generally trashing the garden, there has not been much to report. Then this last week we got a big step closer as this is now the view from the kitchen / diner.

The patio doors are in and that signals we are into the final stages of the build. It mean I can start to plan for the day they remove the rest of their stuff out of the gardens and the real fun can start. There are currently on-going discussions with my OH about the area in front of the doors, I think it is a perfect plant display area for some of my pots, but she seems to think that we should use it for table and chairs. You would think she would know me better by now.

To celebrate I went on the first plant buying tip of the year, to one of the rare plant fairs they hold around the UK.  It was a spur of the moment decision, as shown by the purchases:

At first this probably looks fine (all be it not very spikie), sadly the back row of plant were bought at the same plant fair last year, the front row, this years.  It does show a certain difference in the attention I pay to the other plants, as I have never bought the same succulent twice by accident. Thankfully there is enough space in the garden for both sets and I guess there will be no waiting for them to form clumps. 

While I have yet to properly start on the design for the front and back, I know they are both going to be more varied than the last garden and while there will be a lot of succulents and gravel sections, there will also be more lush and shade areas.  I am considering using rock gardens as a theme throughout and just swapping the planting medium in the different sections. That lot should all be perfectly happy in different sections.

Another plant I picked up was eremurus 'Oase'.  This is the third variety I have, and want them scattered around the gravel beds.  I'll do another post on these later.  Two different plants that found their way into my car were creeping clematis. I saw these somewhere as different plants to have in an gravel bed.

I want to try and get some different types of plants into the planting and theses looked amazing in the pictures I saw. Time will tell if they cope with my lack of watering and care. A friend who specialises in clematis (but ironically hates these forms) says they should do well in my type of gravel bed. If I can keep them alive I may use them on the green roof and vertical planting areas as well.

Very exciting to be thinking of getting into the garden again, sadly the doors have also highlighted how much closer the garage is to the house (and how ugly it is!).

The next project is to knock it down and build a smaller one in the section that is currently hidden behind it.   Then again maybe I should wait until the current project is actually finished before starting to plan the next one.